In the preparation of newspapers it is the practice to first prepare the articles in the form of headlines and columns exactly as they will appear in the newspaper as printed. In modern newspaper plants this is accomplished by means of computer typesetting and photographic film techniques which serve to type the copy in columns with appropriate headlines. To lay out the newspaper as it will finally appear, the film must be carefully trimmed exactly at the edge of the typed portion, care being taken not to cut the headlines which may be typed with a wider heading. To this day trimming operations are mostly performed by hand. In some modern newspaper facilities machines are used. Typical of prior art machines are those disclosed in Pretz U.S. Pat. No. 3,791,247 and Brown U.S. Pat. No. 3,241,415. Other prior art devices are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 246,923, 1,730,196, 2,000,175, 2,360,653 and British Pat. No. 23,952.
All of the prior art patents suffer from various deficiencies, including lack of sufficient speed both in the cutting operation and in the setting up of the film for trimming, and in the lack of accuracy in the trimming operation. Furthermore, the prior art machines are difficult to adjust during operation for columns of varying widths, and for films of different widths.